Date and URL Widget Troubles

Good evening. Two issues I’m hoping for some insight on:

• In trying to insert a TV using the Date data type/Date Formatter widget, I succeed in seeing the TV on my template page but the field cannot be edited and the calendar does nothing when clicked. The field says "(not set)" ... and
• When using the input type URL and Hyperlink widget, I’m getting this output sporadically on save—"$v"—in front of the originally input text. For example, "www.host.com" gets returned as "$vwww.host.com". Note that this TV I’m having trouble with—[*articleSURL*]—has a call to another TV—[*articleSource*], which has plain text input/output—in the Display Text field of the Hyperlink widget.
  

Also, is it possible to change the date format on the backend (what appears in the manager)—for both the TV mentioned above and the core publish/unpublish date fields?

Second issue is this one.
http://modxcms.com/bugs/task/980

Thanks, that took care of that prob!